'You're just looking for somebody to blame:' Man maintains innocence as he's sentenced to life for 1992 cold case murder

View full sizeFile | The Saginaw NewsRodney A. Slayton, 45, listens to a witness during his trial before Saginaw County Circuit Judge Fred L. Borchard. Slayton was sentenced Wednesday to life without the possibility of parole for first-degree premeditated murder in the Feb. 1, 1992 strangulation death of Lynette E. Gibson.

SAGINAW — Lynette E. Gibson’s family think they now have closure from Gibson’s 1992 strangulation, but they really don’t, Gibson’s convicted killer said today.

As he stood before Saginaw County Circuit Judge Fred L. Borchard for his sentencing, Rodney A. Slayton continued to proclaim his innocence in the Feb. 1 death of Gibson, a mother of five.

“You may feel like you have closure,” Slayton told the family, “but you’re just looking for somebody to blame. You think you have closure, but in all reality” the wrong person was charged.

After 40 minutes of deliberations last month, a jury convicted Slayton, 45, of first-degree premeditated murder of the 39-year-old Gibson.

Slayton’s attorney, Rod O’Farrell, said Slayton “will exercise his right to appeal.”

There was not much suspense after Slayton spoke, as Borchard did not have any discretion in sentencing Slayton, who last lived in Midland County, to the mandatory life without the possibility of parole. The judge gave Slayton credit for 448 days served.

Saginaw County Assistant Prosecutor Paul Fehrman, who tried the case, said Gibson’s children “have expressed themselves very eloquently” in written victim impact statements, but did not wish to address Borchard because of the lack of discretion the judge had.

Gibson’s younger sister, Dorothy Davis, said outside the courtroom that she didn’t think she would see the day that somebody would be sentenced for her sister’s murder.

“We’re glad that they got somebody,” said Davis, one of Gibson’s six siblings.

Davis mostly brushed off Slayton’s contention of innocence.

“DNA proves it; we got closure,” she said. “It’s over.”

Davis sat with several family members throughout Slayton’s trial, listening to Slayton's relatives testify about Slayton confessing his guilt and viewing pictures of Gibson's barely clothed body dumped in the parking lot next to Ewald's Bar on South Niagara in Old Saginaw City.

State police Detective Trooper Robert Dunham and retired Saginaw police detectives David Bearss and Roy Walton re-opened the investigation into Gibson’s death as members of the now-defunct Cold Case Homicide Unit of the Saginaw Police Department's Violent Crime Task Force. The team secured four murder convictions and now is finished investigating old cases.

Fehrman, the prosecutor, said that the case was "simple,” with Slayton's DNA matching semen found on Gibson's body and the testimony of Slayton's ex-wife and her uncle, who both said that Slayton confessed to killing Gibson. In a taped four-hour conversation with his current wife, Sandra Slayton, from prison in Jackson, Slayton made numerous admissions about the incident but never actually confessed to the crime.

O'Farrell argued that the DNA match only proved that Slayton had sex with Gibson, who O'Farrell said was a prostitute.